Poetry by Lora Kinkade

              Nathalie CC


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banana belt

all things cede to pollination.

your aunt’s house with its two wheels. 

the clay was firm but bled its own soppy milk 

onto our knees. you were a natural, 

& coaxed a perfect vase in minutes. 

i watched a solitary bee file 

in & out its manufactured home & felt 

the gutless clay ascend & wither, inimical.

the garden—a croon of insects.

the fruit—resting in tight, provocative clusters.

the oppressive buzzing. the saccharine, fomenting stench.

no wonder the clay resists fixity; no wonder

your mother does nothing but draw cards, etch

horoscopic wheels, melt into the divan where you used to bed 

your wife. the orchids, trailing up the ficus,

bolstered by its suffocation—swollen, unseasonal blooms. 

when i leave, you snort lines with an old friend

while his daughter sleeps in the next room & the labrador 

swims frantic laps in the sepal-shaped pool.

even gut-deep in the gulf, the water resists orientation.

am i the land of plenty?

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Lora Kinkade is a queer, rural poet residing in eastern Washington state. She received her B.A. in Creative Writing, Poetry from UCSC. She was a founding member of the Omni Writing Collective. Her most recent publications include Driftwood Press, Damaged Goods Press, and The Bombay Gin. She was a runner-up in Omnidawn’s 2018 Single Poem Broadside Contest.
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